Movie Nite: Carrie

October movie nite:

Carrie

The release date is November 3, 1976, so it's a year older than me. That's kind of fun. Also November 3 is Godzilla's birthday.

I think I had seen this one before. It wasn't nearly as scary as I remembered. By far the best out of the several campy and several slashers we've seen this month. You probably can't go wrong with Stephen King. It was spooky, had a plot, and had some magic to mix things up a little. It didn't kill the women for having sex like some others, so That's a plus. Did it equate women with being witches emitting  a polluting substance as this article brings up? Maybe. I'll entertain that. I think greater was the comment on religion - that Carrie's ignorance that caused her shame was caused by her mother's abuse and religious beliefs. So, I don't know on balance whether this was necessarily a feminist flick. It could go either way.

Leaving the question of whether or not the movie is particularly feminist or not for a moment, my daughter had seen it done in some form in this show she likes, Riverdale. It's everywhere in pop culture. It was kind of fun to show her the original. 

It's got telekinesis and stuff and a little horrible religion messing people up. I like the way the people the mother evangelized to really didn't pay much attention. Mixing up the magic and religion is a pretty good choice - it makes you think about believers and manipulation and related things. She gets her period at the beginning and is kind of an outcast, so those are always good themes as well. Coming of age and feeling like an imposter are themes with a lot of material. Getting your period comes with a lot of those things represented in a person grappling with finding out they have a power and need to develop it - extra responsibilities, the need to learn a lot of things very quickly, extra dangers, etc. And as I type, it's interesting that I'm comparing a supernatural power to getting one's period because I've always thought of it as the opposite of a power. Maybe my thinking is influenced by the patriarchal culture.
It's always been an unfair burden, something that holds me back physically and or emotionally, gets in the way, has to be managed and planned for whether you want to or not so you don't bleed everywhere or get pregnant. The fact that the telekinesis came with her fist period was an interesting and maybe not insignificant plot point. 

I had imagined it as a bit scarier than it was. The scariest thing is actually the lighting and camera angle at the school dance (at which the iconic pig blood scene occurs). It captures school in a fairly exaggerated but familiar way. There's only one murder and it's not like a rampage - it's rather justice that no one else seems to be able or willing to deliver. I didn't even really remember the Jesus voodoo doll thingy from the first time around, but it was featured prominently in the doll and the abusive mother's death. I guess that's why I liked the movie, the most vulnerable person was sort of protected instead of picked off and tortured more like in a slasher movie. Well, except for the fact that she died. So, again, not sure it's particularly feminist, but it's got more going on than your average slasher/thriller.

A few other things worth noting that critics have brought up is the mother being the source of the harmful patriarchal religious abuse, so it's kind insult to injury like women are inflicting this on themselves; men are answering for nothing. And tied to that, treating menstruation as a shameful thing - and again the mother didn't educate her because of enforcing the extreme patriarchal religious view of women as sinful, dirty beings. It's hard to say for sure, but worth discussing.